The Concept of Self: A Study of Black Identity and Self-Esteem

6. Another Look From Another Angle: A Move Toward Theory

CHAPTER 6 Another Look From Another Angle: A Move Toward Theory There is no road to the universalexcept through theparticular. -W. E. B. DuBo~s I n this chapter, I formulate a tentative theory, one that is informed by past theorizing and the insights garnered from past research, and by some of the contemporary perspectives that have been formulated to explain the self-concept of African Americans.' I attempt to compile the relevant assumptions from a wide variety of sources, with an emphasis on those formulations that are testable. Moreover, the major thrust of the theory or theory fragment is to explain the antecedents that produce the sense of self and a sense of group. The predicted outcomes of the self-concept wdl also be explored, both to extend the scope of the theory and, primarily, to validate my conceptualization of the self-concept and to test the proposed hypotheses using exploratory data. This endeavor may be usefully conceived of as the process of theory construction. Given the many positive aspects of the data upon which my analysis is based, I rely heavily on the findings derived from the rich data sources used in the previous chapters. I synthesize the thinking from many sources, with an emphasis on transcending their shortcomings and incorporating their insights, wisdom, and revelations. By examining surface structures, one can gain some helpful knowledge; however, one of the major values of taking a scientific approach is that one can penetrate to deeper structures and see things that are not immediately obvious. This entire endeavor is an attempt to probe the deep structure of the self-concept of African people. A considerable amount ofwhat we think we know of the African self-concept is based on many faulty assumptions and inadequate methodological and epistemological conceptions (Myers, 1998). 126 THEORY CONSTRUCTION To improve our understanding, I first present the major assumptions undergirding the literature on the self-concept. These are the assumptions that have been thought to be relevant across cultures. Second, I present the assumptions that are particularly pertinent to African Americans. I provide a rationale for treating African Americans as being influenced by forces quite different from those affecting non-African Americans. This entails an articulation of the thinking of many different scholars who have looked at the question from many different ideological and philosophical perspectives. Third, from these different assumptions, I formulate different hypotheses and a rationale for each. This involves tappinginto severaltheories ofvarying levels of formality to act as the theoretical linkages for the hypotheses. The hypotheses predict the antecedents and, in limited instances, the outcomes of the self-concept. Finally, operating from an extended set of assumptions and with additional self-concepts drawn from these assumptions, I present an alternative representation of the African American self-concept. This approach leads to a new conceptualization of the self-concept. Global Assumptions While I argue that an extensive set of assumptions is required to address the experiences of African Americans, I find that researchers have used several general assumptions to characterize the experiences of the self across cultures. Drawing from many sources (e.g., Kambon, 1992; Myers, 1993; Nobles, 1986, 1992; Triandis, 1994), I conclude that the relevant general assumptions are as follows: 1. The self-concept is the cognitive component of the psychological process known as the self. 2. Individuals possess many self-concepts. 3. The self-concept is situation-specific. That is, self-concepts tend to operate in specific situations producing particular self-conceptions. 4. The self-concept is ahighlycomplex, evolving entity, offering different components of its totality for investigation. Sometimes the structure of these components is studied, and sometimes the focus is on the broad dimensions of the self-concept, such as self-esteem, identity, and self-confidence. OperationalAssumptions Throughout this analysis, as is often the case with any investigation of the self-concept of African Americans, there is a set of assumptions that are Another Look From Another Angle 127 evident, if not always made explicit. Some recent theorizing has addressed the general issue of the self-concept as having two dimensions-Western and non-Western. The work of Markus and Kitayama (1991, 1994) is instructive in this regard. They have noted that Western or European American theories of the self argue essentially that people are independent, bounded, autonomous entities who must strive to remain unencumbered by their ties to various groups and entities. The individual is thought to...